How the worst training is generated… I’ve listed some cases. I think it’s a common story in (only?) Japan. Be careful when planning training.
Sometimes I see (do) training that is unhappy for everyone, the participants, the planner, and the instructor.
The late Katsuya Nomura (former professional baseball player and manager) famously said,
There are miraculous wins. There are no miraculous losses.
Following that,
There are miraculous trainings that go well, and no miraculous trainings that fail.I can definitely think of something that caused the unhappy training I’ve experienced.
Here are some examples…
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いいね！しよう
Specific example 1: Desire to push participants
The head of human resources at a certain company said this during a business meeting regarding management training…
“Our section managers have a naive way of thinking, so I want the instructor to give them a stern warning. We don’t need shoddy training. I want them to realize how poorly they manage.”
“We don’t need group work. I want the instructor to call on them individually, ask them tough questions, and embarrass them.”
You may wonder if there are people who would say something like this, but it’s real.
Since the head of human resources didn’t seem likely to change his mind during this meeting, we decided to back out of the business meeting. Because we don’t think that questioning people so relentlessly will change their attitude or behavior.
Follow-up: It seems that another company took on this training, but the mood in the class was extremely apathetic, and the results were disastrous.
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Specific example 2: Treating dialogue and discussion as unnecessary
A comment made during a meeting about management training.
“Our manager is excellent, so classroom learning and group work will be kept to a minimum.”
“Our manager is excellent” is often used as an introductory phrase (lol).
Guessing what this statement means…
- I don’t want the trainees to complain later, so I’d like you to do a proper training.
- Please keep the pace up so that the trainees don’t get bored.
- There are a lot of trainees who say things that sound logical, so be careful.
- There’s no need to do reflections or discuss them in groups, because it will bore the trainees.
- Managers are busy, so they want to finish the training as quickly as possible.
That’s about it.
The above 1-3 are like “Leave it to me,” but the above 4-5 are sometimes not something I can say “Yes, I’ll do it that way.” This is because I can’t guarantee the effectiveness of the training at all.
People who don’t understand the value of dialogue and discussion/have never felt it themselves are likely to make such statements.
Managers are lonely in their daily lives. Some managers want to hear the experiences and thoughts of other managers through training opportunities. Listening to other managers’ thoughts can sometimes lead to learning and realizations.
It’s better to do nothing than to try to finish it quickly, using the excuse that “our company’s managers are excellent.” It’s a waste of money and time.
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Specific example 3: An organization where you can’t speak up to your superiors
“Not being able to speak up to your superiors” generates the worst training.
We were having a meeting with a certain company to discuss management training. The participants on the other side were the section manager and several members of the human resources development department of the human resources department.
The implementation date was approaching, but the content was not finalized for a while, and was finally finalized five days before the actual event.
On the day of the training, as we were preparing to start, the head of the human resources department showed up and said a few words to the section manager.
“I looked at the training materials, but the things I told you before aren’t included in the training! What’s going on! Change the content immediately!”
In response to this, the section manager (and of course the other members) did not argue back, let alone offer any opinions. They just said, “Yes, I understand.” Everyone’s expressions were stiff.
The training proceeded based on the training materials already prepared, incorporating the manager’s requests as much as possible, but the content was sloppy… The trainees’ reactions were also poor.
Later, I asked the section manager of the human resources department, and he said that even when he urged the head of human resources to confirm the training content, he was slow to respond, and at the end there was no response. Since there was not much time until the actual training, the section manager decided to “go with this” without getting the manager’s final response.
The HR manager’s work was also problematic, but I was stunned by the situation where no one could say anything to the manager. The trainees were being left behind.
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Today, we talked about the causes of terrible training. There are many other reasons for this.
Training is originally conducted to “contribute to management.”
We must not lose sight of that.
